Partners
by Jennifer Wand
Summary: Doumyouji and Tsukushi have a heart-to-heart on the mysterious boat.


PARTNERS  
  
A Margaret Elseworlds/impromptu fic  
by Jennifer Wand aka Tiptoe39 aka Yukinon  
  
The shortest distance between Point A and Point B is a straight line.  
But the shortest distance between Point A and Point Fanservice is a really  
smooth line! :  
  
-----  
  
"We're...." Tsukasa's eyes were huge round beads of surprise as he sat up on the unfamiliar linoleum floor. "We're on a boat?"  
"It's not your family's boat, is it?" Tsukushi asked, kneeling on the floor a few feet away.  
"Told you, I've never seen it before," he said. "Damnit!" He slapped a hand onto his knee with a sudden sharp, loud noise. "What the hell is going on here?"  
He started to get up. "I'm going to find the bastards behind this and beat the story out of them!" But as soon as he rose to his feet, his shoulders wavered and his hands flew out in front of him reflexively as he stumbled forward. Tsukushi gave a little cry and rushed toward him. Shaken, he staggered, stood with knees bent and his hand cradled between two raised arms. "Goddamnit," he cursed, his eyebrows a knot of frustration.  
Tsukushi put a hand on his arm. "They stunned you," she said, quivering a little herself at the memory. "With one of those weird little machines. You shouldn't try to get up too fast. Here, lean on me." She grabbed his wrist and slung his arm over her shoulder, and Tsukasa winced at the flash of sweetness that passed through his already-weak body. "There's a couch over there," Tsukushi said. "Let's go sit down."   
They sat in uncomfortable silence for a few minutes. Tsukushi stared timidly at his big hands, still clamped to his head as though to keep it from spinning. The gears of his brain were locked in thought, as though he were trying to untangle a million knots at once. A few inches of space separated them - enough to make them feel a little too much like strangers, to provoke this odd silence and hesitation - but not nearly enough to quell the turbulent rushes of emotion that rocketed between them like gravity or high tide.  
Tsukasa's eyes popped open suddenly, and he lifted his head. He turned to her, face filled with confusion. "Why are you here?" he asked in utter disbelief.  
"You got a problem with it?" Reflexively, Tsukushi clenched a fist.  
"No, not that, moron." Tsukasa rolled his eyes in annoyance. "Think about it a second. If their job is to keep me away from you, why are you on this boat with me? And in the room with me alone, to boot?"  
"You're right, that's weird." Tsukushi said. She frowned, beginning to work out the mystery in her own mind, when suddenly a wave of self-awareness brought color to her cheeks. It felt so _natural_ to sit there next to him, the two of them working together to solve yet another problem, clear another obstacle that had appeared in their path. They weren't even touching, weren't even talking. They were just sitting there in silence, thinking about the same thing. But, Tsukushi realized, she felt as close to him as she'd ever felt. A sweet aching heat passed through her body like the rosy kiss of first dawn. Her mouth opened in spite of herself. "Doumyouji...."  
He turned.  
"When I got back from New York," she began slowly, just realizing herself what story she meant to tell, "everyone was there. They were in my apartment camped out, waiting for me to come back. And of course, the first thing they wanted to know was, did I see you?"  
Tsukasa nodded, as if answering that question himself.  
"And when I said yes," Tsukushi went on, "the next question was, 'Well, where is he then? Why didn't you come back with him?'" She let the question hang in the air, as if to give him an idea of its weight.  
"What did you tell them?" he finally choked out, breaking his long silence.  
Tsukushi averted her eyes. She whispered something in a sorrowful voice.  
Half not hearing, half wishing he hadn't heard, Tsukasa leaned closer. "Huh?"  
"I said 'We broke up.'" Tsukushi turned her face back to his. The day's worth of tears that she'd been hiding behind a smile all this time - tears of joy, tears of relief, tears of sadness, tears of fright - finally burst forth, and she sat mutely, looking up at him through blurred eyes, rivers rolling down her cheeks.  
Tsukasa's voice was a hoarse roar of incredulity. "WHY!?"  
"What else was I supposed to say?" Tsukushi retorted, her anger trying in vain to cloak the deep shuddering sadness pouring out of her. "You looked at me like you didn't know me! If you look at me with eyes like that, what am I supposed to think? I came across the world for you! And your first words were 'What did you come here for?'... You didn't even look away, like maybe you were faking it - you just stared at me with those cold eyes. At that moment I thought to myself, no more, I can't stand it anymore!"  
The dam broke then. Tsukasa reached out and, with all his strength, grabbed her and pulled her in toward him. She went crashing against his chest, his hands (oh god those big hands she'd been staring at, craving!) locking her in place. Unable to move, she inhaled his scent, gasping. She felt his desperation so keenly. Or perhaps it was her own desperation, her own desire. All she knew was, her head was swimming and he was all around her.  
"Bakayarou!" Tsukasa said hotly into her hair. "You still don't get it? After everything, you still don't understand my feelings?"  
"That's not... what I mean." Tsukushi caught her breath, trying to find the space for words between the rising and falling of Tsukasa's chest that threatened to swallow her. Oh god no, her mind cried. I can't think when he's this close to me!! "How can I be with you without being with you? If you shut me out the minute there's danger, if I can't even believe you when you say you'll see me tomorrow, then there's really no US, is there?"  
"I came, didn't I?" Tsukasa protested. "I kept my promises!" His arms tightened as if to crush her with the weight of his sincerity.  
"Not all of them." Tsukushi's voice was insistent. She fought for her breathing room, pushing against his chest with her hands. "What about my poor uneaten bentou? What about the time I spent waiting for you on the roof of the school?"  
"Someday, Makino!" he cried out.  
"Someday?" she echoed, pushing him away once and for all so she could face him. "'Someday' isn't good enough. Besides, there's one promise that you can never keep, Doumyouji. You can't go back in time and see me tomorrow."  
"But..." Tsukasa's voice hit a fever pitch. "But we might not HAVE tomorrow!"   
She felt, rather than heard, the words. In a rush of wind so great all other sound was drowned out, the world shifted around her. He'd pulled her close again, fast as lightning, and now that lightning was flashing through her body, her soul even, and she realized his lips were on hers, that he was kissing her ferociously. Warmth filled her - warmth and love - and as a huge heavy teardrop made its way down her cheek, she let her eyes slit closed.  
Did they really not have tomorrow? The thought was almost too sad to bear. But the seductive warmth and comfort, the intense sensation, was killing her resistance. How she wished she could just accept that as fact, take this moment for all it was worth! How she wished she could forget about tomorrow and the next day, and just kiss him until her very soul melted away!  
But that wasn't possible. Suddenly, the ghost of Shigeru was in her head. "If you love him," she said, all blonde hair and big searching eyes, "is it so bad if things break? Isn't that how big a deal love IS?" God bless Shigeru and her honesty, her simplistic way of seeing things. Somehow, through everything, those words were enough. The answer came to Tsukushi, and she embraced it. Once more, deliberately, she pushed Tsukasa away.  
"Dame yo," she said calmly. "Dame da yo, Doumyouji."  
Pain reflected in his eyes. "Makino...?"  
"It's no good, Doumyouji," she said. "I can't accept a love without tomorrows. If all you can give me are stolen days, I'd rather just stop it altogether."  
He stared, registered what she was saying. His expression twisted slowly into rage. "You really don't get it, do you!?" he roared. "I was trying to protect you, and you..."  
"I told you over and over," Tsukushi said softly. "I don't want to be protected."  
"You -" Tsukasa fell back, letting go of her. His hands dropped to his sides and his shoulders began to shake again. He felt week, defeated. "You really do want to break up with me!"  
"That's not true." Tsukushi's voice was still quiet.   
His tortured face convulsed, then relaxed. He stared at his lap. "Then what do you want from me?" he asked, in a tone matching hers in volume if not in tenor.  
She turned to face him, then. He was still hunched over, dejectedly, but the warmth pouring forth from where she sat was overwhelming. Slowly - so slowly - he turned his head. And when he finally saw her face, the simple smile, the gentle expression stole his breath and made his heart race.  
"Everything," she said simply.  
And then she moved in toward him.  
Leaning her forehead against his cheek, her eyes hovering half-open just above his lips, she put her hands on his. He couldn't move, couldn't breathe. His fingers trembled beneath hers, and it was all he could do to swallow and keep staring at that incredible face so close to his. "Do you know why I followed you to New York?" she whispered.  
"W-why?" Tsukasa choked out, the small portion of his brain that could still think now whirring anxiously. A million possibilities flew by, and he tried desperately to pick out what she was going to say. But even that last tiny piece of logical thinking flew through the air and shattered into a million pieces when he felt the puffs of breath against his neck and heard, just faintly, the only thing he never expected her to answer.  
"Because I love you."  
His whole body began to tremble. He wanted to speak, wanted to do something, but nothing came out.   
She went on. "I love you," she repeated, sending him into a fresh round of tremors, "and I wanted to help you the way you've always helped me. So now that I went all that way, can we call it even? I don't want to keep on playing that game forever.  
"For the longest time, Doumyouji," she confessed, "I was too afraid to admit how I felt about you. Because I knew that if I let myself love you, there would come a day when my whole world would fly apart. But I did, and that day came. But do you know why? It wasn't because we were caught, or because I had to spend all my money to run off to a foreign country, or because I had to face your mother head-on. The ice cracked beneath me for only one reason - because you'd gone away."  
Her head slipped gently onto his shoulder, and her hands released his to slide around his waist onto his back. Her embrace and her words made him dizzy with some sentiment more golden than the sun. But still afraid, still not sure what she was intending to do, he did nothing but put one tentative hand on the small of her back.  
"I thought I was scared of being hurt, of losing myself or everything else. But I'm not scared anymore, Doumyouji," she sighed, her voice strangely melodic. "I don't need to run away from you so I won't get hurt. Because now what I'm afraid of, more than anything else, is losing you. I'm not afraid of being hurt anymore. So please..." She paused on the word. Tsukasa listened hard, as if he might miss her words even in the silent room. "Please, stop being afraid of me hurting too."  
"What... are you saying?" said Tsukasa slowly. He was trying to follow the train of all these fears and realizations, but he felt hopelessly lost nonetheless.  
"Don't run away anymore," she said. Before he could even start the inevitable protest, she had gone on. "Don't leave me anymore just because you think it'll protect me. I'll protect myself. But instead of protecting me, can't you protect _us_?"  
"I don't understand," he gasped out, although he thought he was beginning to.  
Her voice was bright when she answered. "From now on, let's be partners. Let's fight against whatever we need to, but let's do it together. No more secrets, no more broken promises, no more sneaking around - not for anybody. My family, your family, everyone at school - they can find out. They can try to break us apart. But they won't succeed if we don't let them, Doumyouji, not if we put the two of us before you or me. Can you do that?"  
Tsukasa trembled fiercely. All of a sudden he understood perfectly, understood the pain he'd put her through, understood her thoughts and her feelings, understood what she was asking of him now. But most importantly, he finally knew for sure that she loved him. And that her love for him was as pure and wholehearted as his own. He heard the clear voice of her soul speaking to him, and it stirred him like the deep rumbles of temple bells on New Year's Eve.  
"For so long," he heard himself say, "I admired you so much. Just like Nee-chan, you were this perfect person. I wanted to do anything for you, but not change you. That'd never do. If I was going to get involved, it'd ruin that perfect person I loved so much.   
"But now it's different. Of course I still love you," he added quickly. "I love you so much I think I'm going to break inside. But more than you, or me, I love the two of us together. I never thought of it that way before, but that's how it is. Is... that what you mean, Makino? By being partners?" He dared to look down then, and he saw tears glistening in her eyes again. "I did it again, didn't I?" he stammered ruefully, feeling all of a sudden like a big clumsy troll. "Don't cry, Makino!" he begged. "Explain it to me one more time and I'll try to get it right. I know I'm..."  
That was as far as he made it before he was tasting the salt water of her tears on her lips as she kissed him joyfully, her arms winding around his neck and her hands tangling in his hair. He gasped, groaned, surrendered, pulling her over onto his lap, leaning his head back as pure ecstacy sparkled and faded all over him like glittering golden fireworks. Her hair fell onto his cheeks and made him feel as though he was in the shade of an immense, holy tree, with flower petals as soft as lips and fruit that tasted sweet on his tongue. It was magic between them, with the gentle splashing noises of the waves all around them and the slight rocking movement beneath them. Tsukasa willed the moment to never end. But when she finally let her lips trail off his and looked down at him with a tear-streaked face full of gladness, he could have looked at her forever.  
"You won't leave me again?" she asked, her smile hopeful but still shaky.  
"Never," he promised, serious-faced. He brushed her hair away from her face and cupped her cheek in one hand, adoring her.  
"Even if the whole world gives us red tags?" she grinned.  
He laughed and embraced her, guiding her head down to rest on his shoulder. "We'll just red-tag them right back," he said. "That worked for some girl I knew."  
"Helps if you kick them in the head, too," she added, giggling, burrowing her face in his neck affectionately. "Especially if they're so dumb they don't give up the first time."  
"Hey, you," he growled, squeezing her. She squealed. "You end up with the whole world in love with you and I'll be jealous."  
She murmured something and after that they sat in silence, locked together comfortably. He stroked her hair gently, treasuring the feel of her breaths matching his, her heartbeat against his. "You know, Makino," he finally said, seriously. "I don't know why they brought you along with me, but it could be that they're planning to do something to you - and with those guys it could be something awful. Do you want me to find a way to get you back before they do?" He felt he had to ask, even though he knew the answer. "I'm sure I could find some way to cut a deal, send you back to Japan..."  
He heard a whispered "Baka" close to his chin and felt her head shake back and forth slowly. "I'm not afraid of being hurt," she said. "Not as long as you're here."  
"Because we're partners, right?" Tsukasa said in a low voice.  
"Right," she answered, and he felt her smile against his shoulder. They lapsed into silence again, but both knew at that moment that their thoughts were the same.  
  
Whatever happens to us, I won't let go of you.  
From now on, everything we face, we face together.  
  
The boat moved through murky waters toward an uncertain destiny. Stormclouds rumbled in the distance. But gold and silver sparkled on the surface of the water, and a smiling sky was waiting somewhere. That was enough for now.  
  
--the really crappy end-- ^_^ 


End file.
